Wednesday, March 12, 2025

Georgia and Tennessee - March 2025

In early March Diana and I made another exploratory trip around the south from our base in Florida.   This time to the cities of Atlanta, Chattanooga and Nashville along with a few places in between.  Initially we were going to drive to Atlanta but there is a lot of nothing between St Petersburg and Atlanta so we decided to fly.  

Atlanta is the USA's largest airport and it was my first time there.  It wasn't a great experience.  A very long taxi from the runway to the gate, a long walk from the gate and then a subway train to the exit.   It's a long haul and it takes time - all a bit overwhelming.

Downtown Atlanta

Our first stop in Atlanta was the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library.  Jimmy, of course, was from Plains, Georgia, and that was a place I had always wanted to visit.  However, in our research I learned that Plains is quite a small place and there is not much there - there is not even a hotel there.  So we skipped the delights of Plains and stayed in Atlanta.  

Jimmy Carter getting his Nobel Prize

I have always admired Jimmy Carter, he was a reasonable President and an excellent Ex-President, and I feel that he made a difference in this world and a difference for the good.  It was most interesting to review Carter's life from his humble beginnings in rural Georgia, to a submariner officer in the Navy, back to Plains and then into politics as State Senator, Governor and then on to the White House.  His post-presidential life has been even more impressive with his work supporting peace negotiations throughout the world, election monitoring, and, of course, Habitat for Humanity.  What a stark comparison to the man we have in power today - what on earth would the current President's library look like.

The grounds of the Carter Presidential Library

The grounds of the Carter Library and Carter Center were quite beautiful - a lovely park setting with lakes and trees and views of downtown Atlanta.

Coca Cola Advertising

Atlanta doesn't have a lot to offer the tourist, at least not in my humble opinion.  However, one of the places that looked like it would be worthwhile was the Coca Cola Museum, so we paid it a visit. Unfortunately it was not really very good.  It was expensive for what it actually was ($25).  Jusst a little history about the development of Coca Cola, the whole secrecy thing around the formula, the uniqueness of the bottle shape, the selling of the bottling rights for $1 but making money on the manufacturing of the flavoring syrup.  One of the exhibits showed many of the world's soft drink brands and flavors.  There was not a single mention of Pepsi Cola which, of course, is their main rival.  

Olympic Centennial Park

Moving on we walked through the Centennial Olympic Park, part of the development for the Summer Olympics in 1996.   Atlanta has many tall impressive buildings and as we wandered around the downtown area we saw the impressively tall and round Westin Peachtree Hotel, some 73 stories tall.  There is a restaurant on the top, the Sundial Restaurant and we paid it a visit.  We had a nice meal overlooking the city - the huge Convention Center, the Mercedes Benz Stadium, the Olympic Park, the Aquarium and numerous tall office buildings each vying for position as the tallest or most impressive. 

Olympic Park and the Westin Peachtree in the center

We left the city before dark and drove part way to our next destination (Chattanooga), stopping in the small town of Cartersville for the night.

The next morning we took a brief drive around Cartersville.  A nice little town but it appears nothing too interesting happened there.  The nearby town of Rome, however, was surprisingly interesting.  Rome was named after the Italian City as it was also located on 7 hills.  The name  of Rome was decided on by drawing names from a hat - each of the town's founders put a name in the hat and Rome was the one picked - it could just as easily have been named Warsaw.

Romulus and Remus in Rome, Georgia

There is a bronze statue of Romulus and Remus being suckled by a wolf in front of the City Hall.  I later learned that the statue was donated to the city by Mussolini back in 1929.  Rome's main street was lined with some very fine buildings that had mostly been kept in good condition.  There was an old Kress Department Store, with their usual fine decorative exterior.  Kress Department Stores had some wonderful buildings.

Coosa River, Rome

We visited the Rome Historical Museum which turned out to be quite informative and interesting.  Mr Pemberton, the creator of the Coca Cola flavor was born in Rome; as was the first wife of President Woodrow Wilson; the creator of the Popeye cartoon character worked on the riverboats on the Coosa River in Rome; a statue of the slave trader and Confederate General, Nathan Bedford Forrest once occupied a prominent position in the town until 2017 when it was removed to the History Museum.   

Rome Clock Tower

On the high ground overlooking the city is a clock tower.  It was first built as a water tower and then later in its life converted to a clock tower.  Quite an impressive structure which, at the time of our visit, was undergoing renovation.  

Chattanooga Choo Choo

After Rome, we drove on to Chattanooga, arriving there in the early afternoon.  Entering Chattanooga from the east as we did, Chattanooga didn't look too attractive - quite industrial, quite shabby, looking quite poor.  The west side of the town, as we later learned, is more affluent.  The train station has a large Choo Choo sign on the top of it - a bit cheesy I thought.   I thought the phrase Chattanooga Choo Choo was created by Glenn Miller but no, it was created back in 1880 to denote the train service from Cincinnati to Chattanooga - the song came along much later.

Chattanooga Railway Station

We dined on typical Southern food - fried green tomatoes, eggs and grits before visiting the railway station to see what all the fuss was about.  Chattanooga was quite the railway hub in its day and the railway station has glimpses of its former grandeur but today it is not much to look at - a large but rather plain ticket hall/waiting room, an old steam engine, a carriage and that's it.

Chattanooga Railway Station

It was a cloudy, windy and cold day with intermittent rain.  It wasn't great weather for exploring any more of Chattanooga so we drove out of town, north towards our next destination, the Great Smoky Mountains.  The road out of town to the west and north was much more attractive - it ran alongside the Tennessee River, and there were lots of new and presumably expensive homes and apartments.

The Tennessee River is a serious river and it was once a major transportation route back in the time of riverboats.  It has subsequently been dammed many times and is now largely a recreational river.  We took a little side step over one of these dams (the Chickamauga Dam) to view Chickamauga Lake - nothing too special about it though.  We stayed that night in Alcoa. a small town outside Knoxville.

The next morning we drove over to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park.  By some counts this is the most visited National Park in the USA.  We entered the Park near Townsend.  There was a visitor center there staffed by concession staff not National Parks staff.  They were remarkably ill informed about the park.

Great Smokey Mountain National Park

It was cold and it had snowed the previous night so the mountains had a cap of snow on them.  The road through the park to the North Carolina side was closed due to snow and to downed trees from a recent storm.  We drove in the park on a loop road through Cade's Cove - very beautiful but not as dramatic as many other National Parks.  

Chapel, Cade's Cove, SmokeyMountains

There was an old cabin and a farmhouse preserved and as well as a couple of chapels.  From the size of the cemetery behind one chapel there must at one time have been quite a settlement in the park but little remains today.  The park boasts that it is the most bio-diverse park in the National Park system.  That was surprising as it isn't a huge park.  Nonetheless there were beautiful wild narcissi and rhododendrons everywhere - it would certainly be wonderful when the rhododendrons are blooming.  The road ran alongside some beautiful mountain rivers with some nice exposures of rock (metamorphosed sedimentary rocks).

The south-west side of the park near Townsend identifies itself as "the peaceful side of the Smokies - an area for uninterrupted relaxation".  I didn't fully appreciate that until we came out of the park to Gatlinburg, the more northerly park entrance.  Gatlinburg was a shock to the system - after a lovely drive through some of the most beautiful country, Gatlinburg is an assault on the senses - hotels, restaurants, every imaginable fast food place, cable cars, amusement arcades - what a horror.  

Dollywood, Pigeon Forge

To add to the horror, just outside Gatlinburg is the equally cheesy town of Pigeon Forge where Dollywood, Dolly Parton's amusement park, resides.  On the day we passed by it looked closed but the size of their vast, but empty, parking lot suggests that it is likely quite a popular destination.

Trump Store near Pigeon Forge

One thing we had noticed in the area was a number of Trump stores.  Presumably where you could buy all manner of Trump memorabilia.  We didn't dare go inside one, in case our political leaning was discovered, but we did snap a photo.  In the area of nearby Knoxville, Google Maps identified four separate Trump stores.  It is a different part of the country there.

The Smokey Mountains from the Foothills Parkway

There was one more piece of the Great Smokeys that was accessible to us and that was the Foothills Parkway.  The entry to this road was near the town of Walland which we had passed on our way into the park in the morning.  The Parkway was a very scenic road on a ridge of the foothills that provided wonderful views to the east into the higher Smokeys.

We then drove back to Chattanooga.  Since it was a clear sunny day we thought we would revisit some of the sites we missed the previous day when the weather was bad.  

The Tennessee River and Mocassin Bend, Chattanooga

The main location we wanted to see was Lookout Mountain.  This turned out to be very impressive.  A modest sized mountain overlooking Chattanooga and a horseshoe bend in the Tennessee River below.  The horseshoe bend is called Mocassin Bend.

Civil War Memorial, Lookout Mountain, Chattanooga

There was a significant battle in the US Civil War to  capture the top of Lookout Mountain.  The Confederates were in control of the mountain, but the Union soldiers had captured the city of Chattanooga below.  The Union Army eventually forced the Confederates out of their perch above the city and then began their push onwards to Atlanta.  The area is now a part of the National Parks Service and there is a small museum there.  It was a beautiful area with great views of the city below.  One could only imagine how difficult it must have been to dislodge the Confederates from the top of the mountain.

The other remarkable thing about Lookout Mountain was that it was also a neighborhood.  The road winds up tree lined slopes to get to the top where you find an entire community of homes.   Very fine homes too.  

There is a sink hole with a waterfall called Ruby Falls on the way up the hill which we didn't get time to see and a children's amusement park called Rock City which we also, thankfully, didn't get to see.

As darkness fell we drove back down the hill into Chattanooga where we stumbled across an excellent Italian restaurant, Alleia.  The food was terrific and we highly recommended it.

After dinner, we drove further north-west towards Nashville stopping in Kimball for the night.

University of the South, Sewanee

The next morning we drove on towards Lynchburg where we were going to visit the Jack Daniel's Distillery.  On the way we got side-tracked to Sewanee which boasts the University of the South.  The University of the South is an Episcopalian School.  The buildings were most impressive.  It dates back to 1857 and was built with the blessing of the English Episcopal Church with funds secured from all sorts of slave traders, slave owners and assorted Confederates.   It has a dark past.

Chapel, University of the South, Sewanee

The campus is quite beautiful with many Gothic buildings clad in the local stone.  While the buildings are built to look old, they are actually quite new with many only finished in the late 20th, early 21st centuries.  We went inside the main chapel.  A magnificent building with a beautiful rose window at one end.

The school may have been out as there were only a few people around.  It did look a bit of a sterile environment - very clean, very tidy, everything in order.  It is of course primarily a religious studies college.  Not a place for your wild student years, but then who knows what really goes on there.

The Jack Daniel's Distillery, Lynchburg

From Sewanee we drove into Lynchburg and signed up for a tour of the Jack Daniel's Distillery.  It was a most educational tour.  To start the tour they bused us up to the top of the hill where there are several barrel houses.  These barrel houses are dotted around the area and there are some 1.9 million barrels of aging whiskey.  Each barrel of whiskey is aged at least 5 years.  

We then moved downhill to the various other parts of the operation - the charcoal production area (Jack Daniel's is filtered in sugar maple charcoal - that is what makes it special), the grinding area (where the material  of corn, rye and barley are fine ground), the spring where the iron-free water issues from the bottom of a cliff, the mash houses where the grounds and water are heated and the fermentation process started, the stills themselves, the filtration tanks, and finally the bottling area.

A flight of Whiskey

At the end of the tour we were given a sampling of whiskey.  There was a flight of 6 glasses in total, 4 conventional whiskeys, and two flavored ones.  I can't remember now the different types but I do remember my favorite was the Gentleman Jack variety.  This whiskey goes through a second filtration phase and it is much smoother.  I could become accustomed to that.  The cinnamon and apple flavored ones were simply awful.

The Black Fungus of Lynchburg

One interesting feature of the area around the distillery was the black fungus that coats most trees and buildings.  First I thought a forest fire had passed through the area but no, it is a fungus (baudoinia compniacensis) that thrives on ethanol vapors and forms the black sooty deposit that clings to everything.  It is apparently not a health risk but it is a nuisance for residents in Lynchburg.   In the prohibition era, it was helpful in finding illegal stills.  You just had to wait until wintertime when the trees were bare and then look for patches of black in the forest.  That would then lead you to an illegal still.

The irony of the whole Jack Daniel's operation, which is without a doubt a big operation, is that Lynchburg is in a dry county of Tennessee, so you are not able to buy the whiskey in any bar, restaurant, or store.  As a paid guest on the tour you can however purchase a bottle, or two, or three....

A quick lunch in Lynchburg then we continued our way to Nashville.  

Broadway, Nashville

Nashville's main street, Broadway, was a real surprise.  It was just bustling with people, mainly young people, and there was bar after bar along the street.  Each bar had live music.  Each bar was pretty much full of party goers.  It was a raucous, cacophony of dueling bands and well-lubricated customers.  That was very interesting to observe for us old folks but not quite our cup of tea these days.  

Tennessee Capitol, Nashville

After wandering around for a while and getting a bite to eat we headed out of the entertainment area to the State Capitol building.  An impressive structure sitting on the high ground above the river below (the Cumberland River).  There were memorials to Andrew Jackson and James Polk the two presidents from Tennessee as well as a statue of Sergeant York, the infamous WWI soldier that was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal for his exploits in capturing a machine gun post and some 132 prisoners.  It was made into a film - Sergeant York with Gary Cooper playing York.

The Ryman Auditorium, Nashville

The next morning we again went into the center of Nashville.  It was quieter in the early morning, but still relatively lively - bars were open, bands were playing, people were drinking.  We walked past the Ryman Auditorium, the so-called birthplace of Country Music.   I remember visiting there back in the mid 1980's.  It was quite different then - much quieter.

Lester Flatt and his guitar

We then visited the Country Music Hall of Fame - a large modern building housing memorabilia from all manner of country musicians.  It was somewhat interesting but country music is not my favorite and how many guitars and mandolins and over the top stage costumes can you take in at one time.  It is a situation of been there, done that and no need to revisit.

Andrew Jackson's Memorial, Nashville Capitol Building
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We again visited the Tennessee State Capitol just to see it in the daylight.   It was a Saturday and International Women's Day.  There was a small protest going on against abortion limitations and other women's issues.  Not a very significant demonstration, at least not at the time we were there - possibly 30 people all together.  

We walked through town and took a seat in a small park where a young women was playing guitar and singing - she was actually quite good.  I imagine you have a lot of competition as a musician in Nashville.  Perhaps it would be easy to get work, but it would be difficult to stand out.  Diana was given a yellow rose for International Women's Day.  I got nothing!

The Parthenon, Nashbille

On our way out to the airport we deviated to look at the full scale replica of the Parthenon in Centennial Park.  Apparently, back in the late 1800's Nashville was known as the Athens of the South so for the Tennessee Centennial Exposition someone decided it would be a good idea to have a replica of the Parthenon in the city.  It is a beautiful structure and is in way better condition than the original Greek version.

Vanderbilt University, Nashville

Nearby is Vanderbilt University.  We only drove by on our way to the airport but the campus looked very impressive.  It apparently is quite a good school.

We dropped off our rental car and somehow avoided any additional penalty for the small damage we created on the front bumper or for the extra couple of hours over our intended rental period.  That made me feel good at least.

Another nice trip, but not an epic trip.










Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Naples, Everglades and Okechobee - February 2025

In mid February we set off from St Petersburg to explore a little bit more of Florida.  We started by driving south to Fort Myers where Thomas Edison and Henry Ford had their vacation homes.  These relatively modest homes are now museums and the public can explore the homes, the gardens and Edison's botanical laboratory.

Thomas Edison's Vacation Home, Ft Myers

Edison was the first to visit Fort Myers and he liked it so much he had a vacation home built there.  Henry Ford, a friend of Edison's, visited him there several times and enjoyed it so much that he bought the neighboring house for his use.  Interestingly one of Henry Ford's early jobs, before he started working on automobiles, was working for the Edison Lighting Company in Detroit.

Edison's Botanic Research Lab

The disruptions of the First World War gave Edison and Ford concern about the supply of rubber for automobile tires.  Most of the rubber then was being sourced from the far east and that was a risky supply route.  The two of them teamed up with Harvey Firestone, the tire manufacturer, and created the Edison Botanic Research Company to try and develop a domestic source of rubber.  They built a laboratory and research garden next to the Ft Myers houses and tested some 17,000 plants as potential sources.  They determined a species of flowering goldenrod was their best option but it was never commercialized.  Other sources of synthetic rubber were later developed so nothing further was done with goldenrod.

Kapok Tree or Aceiba

Banyan Tree

There were some impressive trees in the gardens of the estate - a huge banyan tree, a kapok tree and a large ficus.  What I was really impressed with was the relatively modest nature of the two homes.  Here were two industrial giants of their time and they lived in a relatively simple fashion down in Ft Myers.  Likely they had more a more lavish lifestyle up north.

Naples Beach

We drove on to Naples in the late afternoon.  Naples was quite a shock to me.  There are nice beaches there with beautiful white sand but beyond that there was nothing to appeal.  Street after street of extravagant large homes, manicured gardens, people driving around in expensive cars.  There was sort of a main street (5th Ave South) populated entirely by restaurants, bars, galleries and expensive shops but there didn't seem to be any particular center to the town - there was indeed no there there.

The other thing about Naples was the early dining experience.  All the fine restaurants on 5th Ave were full of diners at 5:00 pm.  I had never seen such a thing.  Apparently they were all taking advantage of the happy hour discount deals.

We should have realized we were in a different world when our usual measure of hotel prices, the Holiday Inn Express, normally around $200 a night was over $400 in Naples.  Being frugal, we stayed a little way out of town at a more humble Red Roof Inn.

The next morning we drove into town for coffee.  The clientele were all well healed and smartly dressed and there was not just one but two Ferraris parked outside.

We drove south-east towards the Everglades National Park on Highway 41.  This is known as the Tamiami Trail, the road that runs between Tampa and Miami.  Before reaching the Everglades we crossed into the Big Cypress National Preserve where we stopped at the Visitor Center for some guidance on what what we should see.  Armed with a rough idea of where to go we drove on for a while before realizing we were going to run out of gas.  We turned back and that brought us to Everglades City, a town we had missed while driving out.  Everglades City is a small town living off tourism with a few hotels, a few restaurants, air boat rides and canoe rentals.

Everglades City Bank Building

Further beyond Everglades City, further south to the end of the road is Chokoloskee Island.  We dined on Chokoloskee Island at Havanna's Restaurant (spelling with two n's as in Anna) - excellent grits and eggs and plantains.

Smallwood's Store and Post Office, Chokoloskee

At the end of the road on Chokoloskee is a small museum in an old wooden store - Ted Smallwood's Store.  The museum is really just a collection of artifacts and memorabilia from the early 1900's.  The store was opened in 1906 and served as a trading post and post office for the first white settlers in the area.  It really had a frontier feel about it.

Smallwood's Store Rear

It was in the store that I learned that Peter Matthiessen had written several books about the area, in particular about some nefarious goings on in Chockoloskee.  I was familiar with Matthiessen but not his Florida books.  I need to add his novel Shadow Country to my reading list.

Alligators basking in the sun

From Chokoloskee we drove east through Big Cypress Preserve stopping at another Visitor's Center where we had an overlook from the boardwalk down to a canal full of fish and alligators.  The fish were jumping but the alligators were barely moving - they just lay there motionless until something sparked them into action, which they do quite explosively, before settling down once more to a life of immobility.  

Clyde Butcher's Photography

Further along highway 41 we stopped at the Clyde Butcher Gallery.  Mr Butcher is the Ansel Adams of the Everglades.  He has taken many beautiful pictures of the Everglades with his large format camera - all black and white, all quite wonderful photographs.

We moved on east to the Shark Valley entrance to Everglades National Park.  The parking at this entry point was full so it was one car in for every one car out.  We had to wait a while at the entrance alongside a narrow canal.  Of course there was the odd alligator cruising up and down the channel.

Great Blue Heron

In the park we got the last two tickets for the next departure of the tram tour around what was a 15 mile loop trail.  It was a great way to experience the Everglades with stops along the way and narration from a naturalist.  Of course there were the usual alligators and snakes but also many fine birds - anhingas, double-crested cormorants, egrets (great and snowy), white ibises, herons of various varieties (great blue, tri-colored), a purple gallinule, several wood storks.   

The Everglades Prairie

I had expected the Everglades to be all green wetlands but no, it was mainly brown prairie that looked quite dry.  However, up close you could see that the ground was indeed wet and swampy.  In the winter the area is usually flooded, in the summer it is drier but still a bit soft and squishy.  Hammocks of trees were scattered around the prairie.  The trees grow where there is a depression filled with water.  This encourages the growth of trees and vegetation and these little mounds of vegetation dot the landscape.  Some are anchored around cypress trees, others around willows.  Of course there are palm trees everywhere amongst the other trees.

Wood Stork

Leaving the park and heading back to the Tamiami Trail, we continued our drive to Flamingo where we were staying that night.  Flamingo is at the end of the road at the southern tip of the park - the most southerly community on mainland Florida. 

Our route skirted the edges of Miami and traveled through land devoted to plant nurseries.  Most of the nurseries, and there were mile after mile of them, were raising ornamental plants and palm trees.

Close to sunset, we drove into the National Park again.  We had the pleasure of being stopped by the Park Ranger for speeding (allegedly).  They checked us out before finally letting us go with a warning.  We drove on to Flamingo at a slightly reduced speed.  It was dark when we arrived at our hotel, the Flamingo Lodge.  A nice modern hotel with a pretty good restaurant.

Mangrove on Buttonwood Canal

Next morning, Saturday morning, we got up and after coffee on the veranda looking south towards the Florida Keys, we bought tickets for a boat tour of the inland waters to the north of Flamingo.  The boat first went up the Buttonwood Canal to Coot Bay.  The on-board naturalist pointed out various sights along the way - a crocodile (called Fred) in the harbor, an osprey nest also in the harbor, various types of mangrove (red, black and white), gumbo limbo trees, tri-colored herons, anhingas spreading their wings out to dry in the sun.

Oysters growing on Mangroves in Tarpon Creek

We crossed Coot Bay and went up Tarpon Creek to enter the large expanse of water in Whitewater Bay.  In Tarpon Creek, a natural waterway, the water is flowing so it can accommodate filter feeders like oysters.  All the roots of the mangroves there had oysters attached.   

Fred the Crocodile, Flamingo Harbor

Back in the harbor at the end of the trip, we found Fred, the crocodile still swimming around.  All in all, a nice trip into yet another different environment in the Everglades.

Back on shore we stopped to observe the manatees floating around in the harbor.  The water was not very clear there so the viewing was not optimal.  We followed this up with a walk along the coast to the west.  It was quite windy so the temperature and mosquitos were moderated. I imagine it would be quite unpleasant in the heat of summer in mosquito season.  

To the west of our hotel, there was an area where some nice tents had been located for those who wanted to camp - the so-called glamping experience.  I can't imagine that being much fun in the heat of summer either.

Dead Mangroves

Leaving Flamingo we came across a large swath of land covered in dead mangrove trees.   It was just like the burned out tree stumps we see in California after a forest fire.  Apparently, in the aftermath of a storm there had been an inundation of the land with sea water, and while mangroves do tolerate a certain amount of salty water, they cannot live if totally immersed in it.  It looked like the recovery might take quite some time.  Unlike after a forest fire, there were no green shoots appearing.

The impenetrable thicket of a Hammock

On the way out of the park, we stopped at two or three spots where the Parks Department had created boardwalks into the wilderness.  The first was an example of a Mahogany Hammock.  The Mahogany trees provide a foundation for other trees and growth around them that result in these islands of impenetrable vegetation sticking out on the flat prairie.  The boardwalk made a circular route through the middle of the hammock. 

Pah-Hay-Okee

The next was Pah-Hay-Okee, a nice viewing platform for looking out over the sea of grass and cypress trees.

The Gumbo Limbo Tree

Finally the Royal Palm area where there were magnificent royal palm trees as well as a lot of gumbo limbo trees.  Gumbo limbos are beautiful red/orange skinned trees with a soft flaky bark.  They call them tourist trees because they resemble the burnt peeling skin of a tourist who has indulged in too much sun. 

Purple Gallinule

At the Royal Palm area there was a bi-crested cormorant, a great blue heron and a crocodile all posing for photographs as people walked by on the trail.  However best of all was a beautiful purple gallinule, a rarer bird, my favorite bird, that also didn't seem to be bothered by people.

We left the park and drove on north along the west side of Miami.  We weren't sure where to stay that night but we wanted to end up near to Lake Okeechobee.  It was Saturday night on a three day President's Day weekend and our choices of hotel were few and far between.  Also we were seeing expensive hotels again - $400+ Holiday Inn Expresses.  We settled for a Best Western in Clewiston on the south west side of the lake.

We arrived in Clewiston after dark.  It was not a particularly attractive town.  Nothing much to see - gas stations, fast food outlets, convenience stores, Dollar Generals and a Walmart.

The Southern End of Lake Okeechobee

The next morning, Sunday morning, we went for a drive around Lake Okeechobee.  Lake Okeechobee is a huge lake, the largest in Florida, some 730 square miles.  It claims to have the best bass fishing in the world but I wouldn't know.  There was a lookout tower on a place called Torry Island at the south end of the lake that we visited.  The lookout provided a view over the southern end of the lake that was mainly covered by reeds and grass.  There were hints of the lake's water in the far distance.

The Armored Cat Fish

There were dozens of dead fish lying around on the trail and in the grass.  They were all armored cat fish - nasty looking black fish with armored skin.  Apparently the Ospreys, of which there were several in the area, are great fishermen, but they cannot tear into the armored cat fish's skin.  Unfortunately they cannot identify the armored catfish until they have snatched them from the lake.  So whenever they catch one they just discard it and go out to find another fish that is less well protected.  The armored catfish is a non-native invasive from South America.

There is a lot of sugar cane grown in central Florida.  One of the ways that they harvest sugar cane is to burn off the foliage from the stems before cutting the cane.  This causes a lot of smoke pollution with all the associated health risks.  We drove along the road and saw a tractor-drawn flame throwers driving along the edge of the fields setting fire to the leaves of the sugar cane plants.  The burning must also bring lots of grubs and insects out into the open because following the flame thrower were hundreds of egrets feeding off the remains.  A remarkable sight.

Fishing for Speck

Along the west side of the lake we stopped at one of the points where a canal enters the lake (there are several canals running from the Atlantic north of Miami to the Gulf of Mexico side).  There were lots of people fishing, nearly all of them black people.  They were fishing for Speck or Speckled Perch apparently - a fish that is good to eat. The Bass Fishermen fishing from their boats on the lake who were more white were likely fishing for sport and trophy fish.

Lake Okeechobee

We drove through the mainly agricultural land with very poor housing to the city of Okechobee where we stopped for lunch.  


The murals of Lake Placid

Driving on towards home we headed to Lake Placid which is not a very big town (just over 2,000 people) and not all that remarkable except - it is decorated with some 40 or 50 murals; it also has a 240 ft tall concrete observation tower, once the tallest cement block building in the world and also once housing the highest public telephone in the state of Florida; the surrounding area is also the source of 98% of the world's caladium bulbs.  Lake Placid was originally called Lake Stearns but a Dr Melvil Dewey from Lake Placid, New York petitioned to change the name to Lake Placid in 1927.  Dr Dewey just happened to be the creator of the Dewey Decimal library classification system.  Who knew such a small and insignificant town could have so much to offer.  Oh and it also is the home of the American Clown Museum and School where you can learn the history of clowning and take classes to become one.

On a Sunday afternoon, the town was almost deserted and not a business was open in the old part of town.  We toured around taking pictures of the murals and then went on our way back to St Petersburg.